I’m pleased to announce the 2019 Canadian player poll, consisting of players in the Canadian circuit! This will be run mostly the same way as the poll last year, with a few eligibility changes. Anyone is eligible for the main poll who played at least one of 2019 ACF Regionals or 2019 SCT in Canada or played at least two regular difficulty+ tournaments in Canada since May 2018 (NASAT, Oxford Open, Cambridge Open, Penn Bowl, Sun God, Spartan, PIANO). You are welcome to consider all tournaments during the year in your assessments however, and certainly analysis in light of advanced stats is welcome. Open players are eligible as in previous years. Your ballot should include 25 players.

Like last year, we will also have a rookie category for players who are new to university Quiz Bowl this year (no university tournaments before May 2018). Any rookie is eligible provided they played at least two non-novice academic tournaments since May 2018 or one of ACF Regionals or SCT. Your rookie ballot should include 8 players. The eligible rookies (as far as I’m aware) are in alphabetical order:

Voting will close on Saturday, May 11th. Please send me your ballot at cwasims@gmail.com (preferred) or by Facebook messenger. If you want to, you can follow-up by posting your ballot in this thread, preferably with commentary.
Stats from all Canadian tournaments are linked below. Note that several Canadian teams played a variety of online mirrors and/or American mirrors this year, so you may also want to look at those stats (not included in the list below).

1. Derek So
He's been much less active this year, but CRISPR babies aren't going to complain about themselves I guess. He is the top player on a team that was head and shoulders above everyone else in Canada this year. The only flaw in his game is his inability to use his height effectively - I'm told he's tall, but it never seems like that when I play against him.

2. Rein Otsason
We all know Rein as the Estonian Science Man, but he also has some deep knowledge of certain branches of philosophy, and the occasional book or two. Also negging. Lots and lots of negging. Looking at the advanced stats, he is probably the strongest player in the middle third of the tossup.

3. Aayush Rajasekaran
Meanwhile dominating the last third of the tossup you have Aayush. Playing with two history players, Aayush has taken up the "everything else" burden. His lit and RMP are no joke, and his science knowledge needs to be taken more seriously. He is the true leader of Toronto J, a team which gave Toronto A plenty of trouble this year, including a upset at ICT.

4. Ian Dewan
Ian's Carleton teams frequently hung around the top of the pack, despite not having much in the way of teammates. Ian is strong in religion, philosophy, and science, with particularly strong CS and math skills. He's also become one of my favorite people to play with, and seems to have finally gotten the message that at a draft tournament you should draft people who are actually going to show up.

5. Daniel Lovsted
He has certainly shown flashes suggesting he could go as high as 3, including almost matching Derek's performance in the ACF Nats playoff, helping the Fartlets to the highest ever finish by a Canadian team. He also had a particularly strong PIANO, approaching Rein-tier scoring without Derek around to shadow effect him.

6. Dennis Beeby
There's a pretty clear gap after the top 5, but 6 and 7 were very close for me. Dennis gets the nod here due to his notoriously conservative play on the buzzers. While he isn't putting up gaudy power numbers unless the pack is dripping with South America content, he's also not gifting weaker teams any games on a neg-shaped platter.

7. Jay Misuk
Jay must get one hell of a dopamine rush from getting powers, because how else do you explain the unending barrage of ridiculous negs he spews out in search of them. Jay's geography knowledge was a big part of Toronto J's strong performance at ICT, beating both McGill and Toronto A.

8. Aaron Dos Remedios
Aaron is Misuk-esque in his negging, but tends to do it just after the powermark. Despite his neg habit, he is one of the strongest visual arts players, especially if ballet counts. His relative weakness in history is a bit surprising, considering how much of it he's lived through.

9. Chris Sims
Chris is probably the most mysterious member of Toronto A, as he doesn't really seem to have his own category but still manages to be the number two scorer. You would think Zhenglin's overlap in auditory arts or Gareth's overlap in history would be enough for one of them to overtake him. But Chris has managed to cobble together some niches and become a solid #2 on a strong team.

10. Erik Christensen
Erik has begun to distinguish himself in the crowded history/geography player market by also getting good at certain areas of fine arts, namely jazz and film. Not that he needs it too much, since he is near the top at history and geography anyways. Someone get this man an NAQT-style open tournament.

11. Gareth Thorlakson
We all expected Gareth to be good. Just not this good. He has quickly made a name for himself among the best history players in Canada, and earned a spot on Toronto A because of it.

12. Zhenglin Liu
Zhenglin has decided that there is not enough singing content in quizbowl and has arranged multiple post-quizbowl singing events to compensate. His specialty areas are extremely deep, leading him to the second-most powers at PIANO behind Rein. However, he has fufsered from inconsistency and the occasional head/phone/whatever else buzz.

13. Akhil Garg
I found 13-15 to be particularly difficult to rank. The top spot in that group will have to go to mega-specialist Akhil. His science knowledge is always in high demand and transfers across difficulties very effectively.

14. Adam Swift
It doesn't get any easier to choose going deeper into the 13-15 block. I think I have a slight advantage over Paul, though. I've expanded beyond being just a history player, with more powers (and possibly more buzzes overall) in RMPSS. I've also done a better job of getting early buzzes in general, as seen in the Sun God advanced stats.

15. Paul Kasinski
Paul has been thrust into more of a generalist role this year, and has been fairly successful in it. He seems to work very well with Raymond, his frequent duo partner. His history knowledge is still excellent.

16. Patrick Liao
Just goes to show how deep Canada is that Patrick's impressive 100 ppg performance in the Regionals prelims were only good enough for 16th.

17. Colin Veevers
Colin has managed to cover pretty much all the science for his Toronto team. A very strong debut season, and we shall see if he can eventually become Rein 2.0.

18. Joe Su
Joe manages to get hidden in the talent-rich Fartlets. A move to Queens and its wide-open non-history distribution should give him a long-awaited chance to show what he can do.

19. Ryan Hamilton
Ryan was nothing short of impressive in the games I staffed for his team at ICT. In addition to being a solid history player, he has very high level current events skills.

20. Sky Li
Sky is one of the strongest fine arts players in Canada. However, he has issues with consistency and scaling up.

21. Raymond Chen
Made famous as the Toronto fan at many ICT games, Raymond is no slouch on the buzzer. He has very deep knowledge in biology and literature.

22. Kevin Lei
Despite Queens being History Player U, Kevin has managed to distinguish himself from the pack. Anyone capable of multiple powers on PIANO deserves a spot in the rankings.

23. Sam Hauer
You know Toronto is deep when we start ranking people from their D team. Sam did basically everything for that team this year, but history looks like his best category.

24. Leslie Newcombe
Even when I'm playing with better players, Leslie is the first person I look to when conferring on a bonus, because that's where she shines. She is conservative to a fault on the buzzer however.

25. Simone Valade
Hot take: Simone should have replaced Joe at ICT for McGill (can't call them Fartlets for that tournament, thanks NAQT). She is a solid player on science, with the glaring exception of physics.

1. Derek So
Not much I can say here. Derek’s the only Canadian QB player who truly ranks among the game’s elite players. Reading for McGill A at Regionals and watching Derek 30 bonus after bonus was quite an awe-inspiring (or perhaps soul-crushing) experience.

2. Rein Otsason
It’s been a great privilege to be able to play with Rein this year and realize just how great he is at Quiz Bowl. Besides being a superb specialist in physics, other science, and philosophy, he has phenomenal breadth which still catches me by surprise (in particular his surprisingly substantial lit knowledge). He’s a threat on every question and it usually results in him being the lead scorer on our team by quite a substantial margin. His main competition for second comes from Aayush, so see Aayush’s write-up for a more detailed comparison of the two.

3. Aayush Rajasekaran
Definitely a close competition between Aayush and Rein for second place this year, but I’m giving Rein an edge. Aayush has seemingly improved a lot since even last year, when I somehow scored essentially the same as him at Nats in a feat that almost certainly wouldn’t be repeated now. His Regionals performance marks him out as the player with the second-highest literature BPA, a feat which only slightly diminished by the fact that he basically was not subject to any shadow effect. His weaker power counts at SCT, PIANO, and slightly lower BPA than Rein at Sun God (despite having a decently higher PPG) all count somewhat against him, while he only did noticeably better on powers at Penn Bowl.

4. Daniel Lovsted
An excellent player who is perennially difficult to rank. Thankfully for my ranking him, he played one major tournament without Derek, PIANO, and did quite well. His power count at PIANO was somewhat lower than the others in the top 5, but even getting above 40 PPG on a strong team in a reasonably strong field is ample testament to his abilities. His over 25 PPG in the Nats top bracket is another stand-out performance—over the five initial playoff rounds he scored as many points as Derek. I also didn’t know he was a choral music player until Joe told me first-lined the Josquin tossup at Nats!

5. Ian Dewan
Ian continued to excel this year, with a remarkable performance at Regionals for a solo player and with minimal support at SCT, where he got almost as many powers as Rein and not many fewer than Derek. His first-buzz percentage at Sun God was also quite high, even as his almost extreme well-roundedness meant he only appeared in the player awards for science despite having (barely) the second-highest PPG. Also one of the more enjoyable players to play against.

6. Jay Misuk
Jay has had some ups and downs this year but has generally played quite well at most tournaments. He had quite a high power count at Sun God and Spartan but less remarkable performances on NAQT sets (surprisingly) and a fairly weak Regionals. I’d definitely say he’s better than anyone below him on the list, though, since he seems more than capable of maintaining a consistently high level of play and is a threat on a huge swathe of the distribution.

7. Dennis Beeby
A strong player who unfortunately couldn’t play much this year. His excellent performance at Spartan and ACF Regionals while playing with other players who also covered his categories speaks to his solid generalism and history specialty. Winning three games in D1 ICT solo is also no mean feat. I’m sad that I’ve never played an econ tossup against him (as far as I'm aware), since he’s probably my main competitor for best econ player in Canada.

8. Chris Sims
This is probably the season where I’ve moved the most outside of my relatively narrow history/music specialty into a wider variety of categories, particularly philosophy, social science, and visual art. I definitely struggle when it comes to power counts, but I generally get a lot of solid middle buzzes and tend to have a decent PPG, which I think makes me somewhat more valuable for actually winning games. I would also make the somewhat bold claim that I’m at least as good, if not better, than Zhenglin at music: I probably got at least 60% of our auditory arts buzzes at ICT, and at Nats I got 8 to his 5.

9. Zhenglin Liu
There’s lots of data to compare Zhenglin and myself, and unfortunately it isn’t particularly conclusive: I generally end up with higher PPGs but lower power counts. However, I almost always end the tournaments with more gets than Zhenglin, which I think makes me somewhat more valuable when it comes to winning games. He definitely has more deep knowledge, though, as evidenced by high power counts at most tournaments. I guess I might also say he’s less consistent, since his lit, myth, and religion knowledge have fairly substantial holes in them that make his performance somewhat more pack- and tournament-dependent.

10. Aaron Dos Remedios
Aaron is an excellent generalist who can take tossups off even the best specialists with the benefit of having heard many, many questions in his time. He definitely has one of the best buzzer instincts in the game, even if that doesn’t usually translate to low neg counts. I’m rating him lower than Zhenglin and I because he seems to generally buzz later and doesn’t have as much deep knowledge to buzz on at higher difficulties, but the competition certainly is quite close.

11. Erik Christensen
Erik is a strong generalist whose history knowledge probably most closely aligns with mine out of anyone on the circuit. He doesn’t tend to score much better than me despite playing on weaker teams and seems to consistently score lower than his frequent teammate Aaron. His PIANO stats weren’t great, but he outscored Ian at Oxford Open and did well at Cambridge Open despite playing with Dennis. Playing against him tends to be a nice break from Toronto A’s seriousness.

12. Gareth Thorlakson
Yet another player who’s hard to rank. Gareth constantly impresses me with his history knowledge and seems to get great buzzes out of nowhere (at least from my perspective). He’s less of a generalist than the history players above him and below him, although Terrapin indicated that he does surprisingly well on RMPSS. He tends to significantly outpower Colin when they play together but is definitely the lowest-scoring player when he plays with Toronto A, so I’m comfortable ranking him here.

13. Paul Kasinski
The third in a series of excellent history players. Paul has become more of a generalist this year, which is probably at least partially due to taking more philosophy courses this school year. He had a strong SCT and Sun God, but did slightly worse than Zhenglin and I at ICT and significantly worse at Penn Bowl. His Regionals stats indicate that he’s a very strong history player, although not quite as strong as Ryan (who was also playing with teammates who got some history). On a subjective level I usually tend to be more impressed by Gareth’s history knowledge than Paul’s, but Paul’s greater generalism offsets that to some extent. Definitely a hard call between him, Erik, and Gareth.

14. Akhil Garg
Now to some easier placements. Akhil is a strong science specialist who scales up extremely well (although going by the Lederberg stats, he’s a fair bit weaker than Rein). He almost entirely seems to get science questions, though, so a lack of generalism hurts him a fair bit. Still, getting 15 PPG on a top-10 team at ACF Nats is no mean feat, and definitely places him as a solid top-15 player. Also one of the most pleasant people to play against.

15. Adam Swift
I’m not sure I’d agree with Adam’s assessment that he’s better than Paul, who outscored him at PIANO while on the same team and did pretty similarly at Penn Bowl despite Paul playing on a much stronger team. He had a very good performance at Sun God, though (with 11 powers), and definitely has pretty strong generalist abilities over a wide area of the distribution.

16. Patrick Liao
Despite being a fair bit out of his prime by his own admission (on the Quizpolling group, at least), Patrick remains an excellent history player who is capable of plenty of early buzzes. His BPA at Sun God was extremely high for someone with a fairly low PPG, and he performed well when playing with Jay, who overlaps with him a fair bit (I imagine?). I wouldn’t say he’s quite as dominant a specialist as Akhil, though, and like Akhil doesn’t seem to score much outside of history.

17. Colin Veevers
A high scorer who can get points in pretty much any category, but especially science. He had a very strong performance at D2 ICT that was key to Toronto C’s success at that tournament. I will say that his buzzes seem to come extremely late: at both Sun God and ACF Regionals, he had a very low BPA, particularly when compared to his high PPG. Getting only 1 first buzz at the Sun God Toronto site is also somewhat worrying for his ability to scale up. Colin’s generalism puts him as a solid 2nd out of the Toronto C squad behind Gareth’s comparatively deeper knowledge.

18. Ryan Hamilton
Ryan had an outstanding performance at Regionals, where he was the 6th best history player overall (across all sites!) by BPA, leading Toronto D to have a better history BPA than Queen’s, which had three very good history players on it. However, Ryan is almost an entirely a history/CE/social science player with seemingly worse coverage outside history than Gareth, who usually significantly outscores him when they play together. A very strong specialist, particularly for a first-year.

19. Jack van Nostrand
Jack had an excellent SCT where he had a high power count and PPG despite playing solo against what was mostly quite a tough field. He didn’t play quite as well at Regionals, though, and not playing as much generally means there’s less data to look at. Notable for being one of the few history and lit players in a circuit that has an abundance of mostly history specialists.

20. Joe Su
Joe’s classical music and science knowledge has filled an important niche on McGill A, but he doesn’t tend to score much on that team and had quite a bad ICT in particular. He had the highest first-buzz percentage at Regionals, though, so he definitely can shine in some situations—it may well be a matter of not scaling up as well as other players. Hopefully he keeps writing music questions—he’s definitely one of the better music writers.

21. Sam Hauer
Don’t overlook Sam just because he plays on Toronto D! He’s a superb history, thought, and fine arts player (although one who clearly needs to listen to more piano concertos). He had a high first buzz percentage at Terrapin even in a field with multiple good players in his categories, and had a great ICT where he led his team to a solid second-bracket finish. I’m very glad he took me up on my suggestion that he try playing Quiz Bowl.

22. Raymond Chen
My former teammate remains great at both bio and lit. He outscored Gareth at Penn Bowl, and performed pretty well on underhanded teams with Paul at Sun God and Regionals. He struggles a bit on scaling up as evidenced by a fairly weak PIANO performance, though.

23. Kevin Lei
Kevin did quite well on a strong team at PIANO and soloing at SCT, but generally tends to struggle when having to play with both Dennis and Jack. He seems to be moving beyond just history too, with several good lit buzzes at Regionals.

24. Sky Li
Yet another excellent player from Toronto’s insane crop of novices this year. Sky does very well on fine arts, particularly music, and somewhat more surprising was one of the highest lit scorers at Terrapin. He maintains quite a consistent PPG while playing on a strong team, and often outscores Ryan, who I’ve ranked higher than him because of his stronger specialist abilities.

25. Milan Fernandez
Milan definitely gets the title of most improved player (coming from a pretty marginal 6 PPG at Collegiate novice in his first year) and I think his performance has been solid enough this year to warrant a spot on my ballot. He can be fairly inconsistent, going from weak performances at Penn Bowl and Regionals to relatively strong ones at Terrapin and PIANO, but overall he plays quite well on a strong Toronto D team. Definitely someone to look out for next year.

Rookie Ballot:
1. Gareth Thorlakson
2. Colin Veevers
3. Ryan Hamilton
4. Sky Li
5. Minh-Huy Phung
Since the first four are already on my ballot (probably a record for number of first years in the top 25), I’ll start commentary with Minh-Huy. He’s played quite well on McGill B both at Regionals and particularly at SCT and ACF Fall. A good history player and (from what I can tell) knows a lot about the Bible.

6. Zhongtian Wang
Zhongtian has taken fairly well to university Quiz Bowl after a stellar Reach career, playing well at Terrapin and ACF Fall. Unfortunately she hasn’t yet tested her mettle on harder tournaments, but hopefully will start next year.

7. Qaasim Karim
Qaasim could easily get overlooked since he didn’t play much this year, but he did well at Terrapin and had an impressive 4 first buzzes and 1 universal first buzz at ACF Regionals.

8. Jade Goh-McMillen
Perhaps my ballot is a bit Toronto-centric, but I definitely think Jade merits a vote as well. Despite not playing well at Regionals, she had a good Terrapin and a very good ACF Fall and I know from Toronto practices that she can get great mythology and history buzzes.

1) Derek So
Was a strong support player in 2007-08 and 2008-09 for Sir Winston Churchill. Too bad their captain came to McGill but never played a collegiate game.

2) Rein Otsason
Went 52-1 or something in 2011-12 on the way to a national championship, probably a top five season this decade (comparable to KV 2010, 2011, UTS 2017, 2018, and Lisgar 2017). Also sat the 2011 provincial final game because their coach didn't wanna carry home the trophy

3) Daniel Lovsted
Led a strong 2012-13 team to a national title and was an alternate on Rein's 2011-12 team. Didn't have the support in 2013-14 to consistently win shootouts, though. However, probably still the best player that year.

4) Aayush Rajasekaran
Ranks a bit lower than Daniel for scalability

5) Ian Dewan
Led a 5-2 Earl of March team in 2011-12, whose losses were to Meghan Torchia's London Central team and....a 1-6 team from Timiskaming.

6) Jay Misuk

7) Dennis Beeby
Made the first round of the Ontario playoffs in 2009, but failed to advance to Provincials in 2010. A 5-2 performance due to losses to Lisgar and Martingrove led to a hard first round opponent and an early exit in 2011.

8) Chris Sims
Came

9) Zhenglin Liu

10) Gareth Thorlakson

11) Akhil Garg
Scales incredibly well in science and managed to learn the social science that Derek and Daniel doesn't know. Incredible performance against Amherst at Nationals alone gives him this spot.

12) Erik Christensen

13) Aaron Dos Remedios
Erik and Aaron don't scale as well as Chris Zheng Other Gareth or Akhil so I'm giving them the nod. Erik gets the edge for NAQT and History prowess, However, Aaron is still top 3, hands down, on easy questions.

Unfortunately, PNW players are ineligible given the stated eligibility requirements. There have been comments to this effect on previous player polls, but I guess the best answer is that the task is to determine the best players on the (Eastern) Canadian QB circuit, not the best players who currently reside in Canada or who are themselves Canadian. The purpose of a regionally-concentrated poll like this is also to facilitate relatively easy comparison between players given the large amount of data available, so including people in a region that never interacts with the circuit by playing QB is not conducive to that goal.

(If you would like to have a poll like this where UBC players are eligible, I'd encourage you to set up one for the PNW circuit! Polls like this are a great way to recognize people who aren't going to receive any attention in the main player poll.)

Chris has provided an excellent summary of the underlying spirit of the eligibility rules, but since there seems to be some confusion about their "nuances", I wanted to just quickly address why PNW players this year aren't in consideration under the letter of the eligibility rules as they are currently written.

This will be run mostly the same way as the poll last year, with a few eligibility changes. Anyone is eligible for the main poll who played at least one of 2019 ACF Regionals or 2019 SCT in Canada or played at least two regular difficulty+ tournaments in Canada since May 2018 (NASAT, Oxford Open, Cambridge Open, Penn Bowl, Sun God, Spartan, PIANO). You are welcome to consider all tournaments during the year in your assessments however, and certainly analysis in light of advanced stats is welcome. Open players are eligible as in previous years. Your ballot should include 25 players.

Fair enough Chris, but in that case I think the poll should probably be renamed to what you wrote ("the task is to determine the best players on the (Eastern) Canadian QB circuit.") I guess my point is that a putatively national poll should, I think, at least try to cover the whole country. Maybe "players currently affiliated with a Canadian university" or something like that could work as an eligibility rule. Although you'd have to iron out the details.

Thanks Raymond for observing that UW is not in Canada. Looking forward to more geopolitical insights.

"We're not going to pay you to come to our tournaments" --- Paul Kasiński

WWP South, 2010-2014
NYU, 2014-2018
University of British Columbia, 2018-Present

The poll is not meant to be putatively national, as the eligibility requirements should make clear (you will note that someone who lives in the US has been included on every ballot submitted so far). The Canadian circuit refers to the players who play tournaments in Ontario in every context that I've ever seen it discussed, and that is why the word Canadian is used for the title of this thread. The fact that Canadian universities several thousand kilometres away also play Quiz Bowl in an entirely unrelated circuit and against completely different universities is not relevant to this ranking.

As I mentioned, you are more than welcome to create a similar poll for your own circuit, but please do not keep commenting on this thread to propose further ways that people could include you on their ballot.

As I mentioned, you are more than welcome to create a similar poll for your own circuit, but please do not keep commenting on this thread to propose further ways that people could include you on their ballot.

I think this is a remarkably naive and uncharitable reading of what I'm saying. I couldn't care less if I was included on this ballot or not; I didn't even know this was a thing two days ago. But Western Canada is part of Canada, there are good players here, and I think on principle they should be at least eligible for what claims to be a "Canadian Player Poll."

The poll is not meant to be putatively national, as the eligibility requirements should make clear (you will note that someone who lives in the US has been included on every ballot submitted so far). The Canadian circuit refers to the players who play tournaments in Ontario

I think Auroni said it best on Discord when he observed that it's "odd that a player who lives in Canada isn't eligible for a Canadian player poll." That's my point. And anything that calls itself the "Canadian Player Poll" is claiming to speak for the entirety of Canada. I hope that doesn't need elaboration.

I'll point out that as we speak there are a good number of others explaining to you that the goals of your poll are clear, but don't make sense given the name you chose.

please do not keep commenting on this thread

Sure.

Last edited by ArnavS on Mon Apr 29, 2019 11:30 am, edited 1 time in total.

"We're not going to pay you to come to our tournaments" --- Paul Kasiński

WWP South, 2010-2014
NYU, 2014-2018
University of British Columbia, 2018-Present

I suppose I could amend the description to make it absolutely clear that the "Canadian" here refers to the circuit and not the country overall, but no one (to my knowledge) has ever actually interpreted the poll this way until you started posting--indeed, if you actually took the name literally and since open players are included, Will Nediger would certainly be #1 on everyone's ballot. Will Nediger, however, does not play tournaments in Canada and is thus is not part of the Canadian circuit, regardless of the fact that he currently resides in Canada. Presumably, if he or any other Canadian played enough tournaments in the US to qualify for a similar poll in some other region, they would be voted for in that poll. Similarly, all UBC players are not part of the Canadian circuit despite being located in Canada. This really isn't very complicated.

I suppose I could amend the description to make it absolutely clear that the "Canadian" here refers to the circuit and not the country overall, but no one (to my knowledge) has ever actually interpreted the poll this way until you started posting--indeed, if you actually took the name literally and since open players are included, Will Nediger would certainly be #1 on everyone's ballot.

In fact, the poll has very much been interpreted in the past in ways other than the way that you find self-evident:

I'll note that Tamara Vardomskaya should be on everyone's ballots because she led the Chicago C team with 23 PPG and 7 powers at the stacked main site of "stanford housewrite" and put up 21 PPG as part of the Chicago C team that finished 20th at ACF Nationals.

Thank you, Naveed, for going back 3 years to find a poll that had substantially different eligibility requirements to prove a point that is clearly not true anymore. Each of the last two polls have had basically identical eligibility to this year's version, and I recall complaints about Rafael not being included were roundly dismissed.

(Not sure exactly, how quoting works on HSQB, but this is from the post you cited.)

The rules are simple: vote for your top 25 of active collegiate players (active being defined as having played in at least one tournament this year AND having never made a retirement announcement) who either attend a Canadian University OR have Canadian citizenship and attend school abroad. If you are unsure of the eligibility of a certain individual, ask in this thread and someone will help you out.

Thank you, Naveed, for going back 3 years to find a poll that had substantially different eligibility requirements to prove a point that is clearly not true.

(Not sure exactly, how quoting works on HSQB, but this is from the post you cited.)

The rules are simple: vote for your top 25 of active collegiate players (active being defined as having played in at least one tournament this year AND having never made a retirement announcement) who either attend a Canadian University OR have Canadian citizenship and attend school abroad. If you are unsure of the eligibility of a certain individual, ask in this thread and someone will help you out.

The point is more "this is a valid reading of what the Canadian Player Poll means (or should mean) given the very first [forums] Canadian Player Poll was exactly what you are claiming it is not".

I understand the part about wanting to compare players of a similar circuit, but in general parlance, I think the vast majority of people would consider a “Canadian player poll” to encapsulate players from all Canadian universities. Even if comparing across sites causes inconvenience it’d still be necessary, I think, for a proper nationwide poll.

I guess the bottom line is this: polls like this are defined by their eligibility requirements. If, for instance, I had just said in the initial post that this was a Canadian player poll and that people should submit 25 players on their ballots, then it would certainly appear that anyone playing at a Canadian university was eligible as well as anyone who lives in Canada, is a Canadian national, or maybe even lived in Canada at some point in their life. This is not, however, what I did, because such a poll would be a motley assortment of people who happen to share a fairly arbitrary characteristic that doesn't seem to unite them in any meaningful way. What does unite all the people who have been voted on in this poll is that they are all part of the Canadian circuit, which regularly meets to play tournaments throughout the year.

I have amended the description to make it absolutely clear that the poll refers to the Canadian circuit and not to Canada or Canadians in general. But citing the fact that a name could be interpreted in a different way that directly contradicts the specific eligibility requirements listed and the obviously intended meaning behind those eligibility requirements does not strike me as a particularly compelling argument. Any poll's name could be interpreted in some way other than the intended meaning (the overall player poll could be interpreted to include open players, e.g.) but that does not mean that the name is misleading or wrong. This name in particular has not been found to be misleading or wrong in the past two polls and I find it strange that it is considered so now when it has always excluded a variety of people who might plausibly have been included a different interpretation of the name.

I know I said I wouldn't jump in again, but I’d simply like to point out that the “fairly arbitrary characteristic” you describe is “being a Canadian Quizbowl player.” Which seems like a good choice, given the poll's title.

Meghan said you get pushback on this every year. Maybe that’s a sign that there’s something worth rethinking?

To be clear, nobody is saying that you can’t have a Canadian Circuit poll. Just call it that (“2019 Canadian Circuit Poll” or “2019 Ontario Region Poll,”) and be done with it. But sniffily dismissing reasonable concerns with “read the rules we wrote” is not a good answer to “the rules are unreasonably restrictive for the scope you chose.” Which is what everyone in Discord and here, except you and Raymond, is saying.

Side-note: Will probably make a bona fide national poll today or tomorrow, if this one isn’t fixed. Colin’s title (“2019 Canadian Player Poll, For Real, This Time”) seems as good as any.

Edit: Slight language/clarity.

"We're not going to pay you to come to our tournaments" --- Paul Kasiński

WWP South, 2010-2014
NYU, 2014-2018
University of British Columbia, 2018-Present

To be clear, nobody is saying that you can’t have a Canadian Circuit poll. Just call it that (“2019 Canadian Circuit Poll” or “2019 Ontario Region Poll,”) and be done with it. But sniffily dismissing reasonable concerns with “read the rules we wrote” is not a good answer to “the rules are unreasonably restrictive for the scope you chose.” Which is what everyone in Discord and here, except you and Raymond, is saying.

Side-note: Will probably make a bona fide national poll today or tomorrow, if this one isn’t fixed. Colin’s title (“2019 Canadian Player Poll, For Real, This Time”) seems as good as any.

I just want to start by congratulating everyone in this thread who has made the astute observations that possible readings of "Canadian Player Poll" include "poll ranking players who are Canadian citizens" or "poll ranking players who currently reside in Canada". We in the Canadian quizbowl community had never considered that before, especially those of us who, though being Canadian citizens, had never in our entire lives had to describe ourselves as "Canadian". Really top notch stuff, you've changed our lives. What a wonderful day for Canada, and therefore of course the world.

Okay, now that I've gotten the sarcasm out of my system:

For the past five years, ACF has referred to one desired site for Regionals as:

2019: Canada/Niagara

2018: Canada/Niagara

2017: Canada/Niagara

2016: Canada/Niagara

2015: Canada/Niagara

For the past five years, NAQT has referred to one site for SCT as:

2019: Canada Sectional

2018: Canada Sectional

2017: Canada Sectional

2016: Canada Sectional

2015: Canada Sectional

Every single one of these tournaments has been hosted in Ontario, and are clearly targeting a particular group of people. I think this is substantial evidence for the position that there is a convention, not solely existing among the members of the "Ontario/Québec" circuit but instead extending to the broader QB community, that "Canada" refers to the well established quizbowl community and circuit which exists in Ontario and Québec. Further evidence can be extracted from how various members of the community use "Canadians" to refer to members of this circuit, clearly excluding certain Canadian-citizen quizbowlers who now play in the US.

I think this issue boils down to a simple point. "Canadian Player Poll" could refer to multiple things. One reading is that it is a poll of players who are Canadian citizens, or Canadian residents, or what have you. This is clearly a reasonable reading, and perhaps it is the obvious prima facie reading. But the fact that this is one possible interpretation does not mean that the interpretation used when preparing the post announcing the poll, and the interpretation borne out by the explicit eligibility requirements, is invalid. The rules are not "unreasonably restrictive", and the poll is perfectly "bona fide" despite the fact that you (Arnav) or others, when first reading the title, came to a different conclusion about the contents. The title is perfectly in line with past and current usage of the term "Canadian player" in the quizbowl community, and I find it highly peculiar, and not a little frustrating, that many people seem to be wilfully ignoring this fact for no better reason than to score a few points in some sort of imaginary feud.

Perhaps with the ongoing expansion of quizbowl in western Canada this convention will have to be reconsidered. But for now it is just a fact that the only group of players and teams competing in Canada against other teams exists in "the area around Lake Ontario" (a phrase of Naveed which I shall borrow, despite Montréal being a few hundred kilometres away from Lake Ontario, unless we're just going to count the entirety of the St Lawrence as part of Lake Ontario).

Rein Otsason
University of Toronto 1T6 + PEY
University of Toronto 1T9

Thanks Rein for the commentary. Of course, I would point out that Western Canadian quizbowl is a part of the "Canadian quizbowl community," but we can have that discussion another time. The implications, though, go beyond "some sort of imaginary feud"; I'd say there is a generally insular and patronizing attitude in the Ontario quizbowl circuit towards Canadian quizbowl elsewhere, and this poll is a prime example.

In any case, I've created what I consider to be a "bona fide" poll here, in the hopes of including/celebrating people outside your geographical niche. If it goes well, we can switch to this format for future years (or, at least, I'll run such a poll in future years; y'all are of course free to continue maintaining the Lake Ontario Wall of Fame.)

Edit: typo.

"We're not going to pay you to come to our tournaments" --- Paul Kasiński

WWP South, 2010-2014
NYU, 2014-2018
University of British Columbia, 2018-Present

People discussing quizbowl-related things is what the quizbowl discussion forum is for.

I don't believe a semantics debate was the kind of quizbowl discussion that this thread was created to facilitate.

That is immaterial. On this the board rules are clear (emphasis mine):

I. THE PURPOSE OF THE BOARD, META-POSTING, AND DISCUSSION-SUPPRESSION wrote: As a result of the above, and of the need to reserve the privilege of moderating the forums for the designated staff members, anything that looks like telling other people not to discuss quizbowl is prohibited. This includes but is not limited to: telling someone that you do not like the “tone” of their post, telling someone that he is being “uncivil” or “impolite,” complaining about being “attacked” by criticism, demanding that people not criticize something that occurred in a state that they do not reside in, demanding that people not criticize something that occurred at a tournament they did not attend, or demanding that people not criticize something for any reason.

man i cant wait for the UBC vs UofT/McGill/Waterloo/McMaster grudgematch that will never happen because UBC will never send a team (or fund the one person who cares) here or just die out before they can

Honestly I'll probably self-fund, at least initially (and if we host another tournament in time, we could probably bring another person or two.) But we were discussing some useful ideas on Discord on how to make it feasible for teams like UBC to play in the established circuit. A special travel discount or subsidy for Canadian teams certainly wouldn't hurt.

Hopefully the club won't die out. It seems like there are at least a few interested underclassmen. And Reach is popular in this area, so I don't see any demographic doom-and-gloom.

"We're not going to pay you to come to our tournaments" --- Paul Kasiński

WWP South, 2010-2014
NYU, 2014-2018
University of British Columbia, 2018-Present

People discussing quizbowl-related things is what the quizbowl discussion forum is for.

I don't believe a semantics debate was the kind of quizbowl discussion that this thread was created to facilitate.

That is immaterial. On this the board rules are clear (emphasis mine):

I. THE PURPOSE OF THE BOARD, META-POSTING, AND DISCUSSION-SUPPRESSION wrote: As a result of the above, and of the need to reserve the privilege of moderating the forums for the designated staff members, anything that looks like telling other people not to discuss quizbowl is prohibited. This includes but is not limited to: telling someone that you do not like the “tone” of their post, telling someone that he is being “uncivil” or “impolite,” complaining about being “attacked” by criticism, demanding that people not criticize something that occurred in a state that they do not reside in, demanding that people not criticize something that occurred at a tournament they did not attend, or demanding that people not criticize something for any reason.

Would it then be reasonable to ask that the "what constitutes the Canadian circuit" talk be moved into a separate thread? It seems pretty clear that the purpose of this thread is to rank a set of players within a subset that has been well-defined and subsequently confirmed by the creator of the thread himself, and having to sift through a side discussion to find the actual ballots is pretty frustrating.

Aaron Dos Remedios
Formerly of the Waterloo School of Abstruse Canadian Inside Jokes (University of Waterloo)

People discussing quizbowl-related things is what the quizbowl discussion forum is for.

I don't believe a semantics debate was the kind of quizbowl discussion that this thread was created to facilitate.

That is immaterial. On this the board rules are clear (emphasis mine):

I. THE PURPOSE OF THE BOARD, META-POSTING, AND DISCUSSION-SUPPRESSION wrote: As a result of the above, and of the need to reserve the privilege of moderating the forums for the designated staff members, anything that looks like telling other people not to discuss quizbowl is prohibited. This includes but is not limited to: telling someone that you do not like the “tone” of their post, telling someone that he is being “uncivil” or “impolite,” complaining about being “attacked” by criticism, demanding that people not criticize something that occurred in a state that they do not reside in, demanding that people not criticize something that occurred at a tournament they did not attend, or demanding that people not criticize something for any reason.

Would it then be reasonable to ask that the "what constitutes the Canadian circuit" talk be moved into a separate thread? It seems pretty clear that the purpose of this thread is to rank a set of players within a subset that has been well-defined and subsequently confirmed by the creator of the thread himself, and having to sift through a side discussion to find the actual ballots is pretty frustrating.

Yeah, I guess this is reasonable (although the question is less "what constitutes the Canadian circuit," and more a discussion about the dynamics of quizbowl within Canada, I think.) In any case, I think the discussions have largely subsided.

"We're not going to pay you to come to our tournaments" --- Paul Kasiński

WWP South, 2010-2014
NYU, 2014-2018
University of British Columbia, 2018-Present

Here's my top five (I'll update this post with 6-25 later, probably at intervals):

1. Derek So

Derek got broader this year, filling in gaps like Religion and some Social Science on McGill A. As a result, our PPBs were very high, especially at Regs difficulty. McGill struggled with tossups this year, though, perhaps because of this (as in, he was focusing on new areas rather than reinforcing/increasing depth in his best categories). Still easily the best player in Canada. He's an excellent lit player, very good at R/M, a spotty but deep history player, able to beat me to VFA (especially at Regs for some reason) and philosophy (wtf was that Anscombe buzz at Nats). A bit slow on the buzzer which hurts him against strong (i.e. fast) teams (e.g. in the Nats playoffs he lost a ton of buzzer races).

2. Aayush Rajasekaran

Aayush well above Rein (idk what most of y'all are on). Aayush led the much stronger team this year (with comparable support). Toronto J did much better against McGill throughout the season, beat Toronto A at ICT (by a lot), and had a better PIANO. (And Toronto J felt like the stronger opponent.) The individual stats bear out Aayush above Rein. During head-to-head games throughout the season, Aayush outscored Rein significantly more times than vice versa, and Aayush performed better against tougher opponents (compare ICT playoffs PPGs: 41.7 for Aayush and 23.3 for Rein).

3. Daniel Lovsted

Me above Rein. Tournaments he and I played together, with relevant stats extracted:
-SCT: He powers more (17R vs. 9D) and has higher PPG (45.5R vs 33.2D). I outscore him in one of two games. I am shadowed by Derek.
-PIANO: Comparable PPGs (46.1R vs. 44.4D). He powers more (10R vs. 3D) but I win one of two games with less support.
-ICT: Prelims PPG in favour of Rein (43.1R vs. 20.3D) but playoffs PPG (23.3R vs. 21.3D) and powers comparable (6R vs. 5D). I outscore him in one of one games. I'm shadowed by Derek.
-Nats: Prelims PPG in favour of Rein (37.9R vs. 25.7D) but playoffs PPG in favour of me (18R vs. 24.5D). Shadow Derek etc.
To summarize, Rein usually powers more and will always have higher prelims PPG (because Derek). But I do better head-to-head and against tough opponents.

Very strong in Physics -- probably the most dominant 1/1 on the circuit. Weaker at his other specialties, though (Akhil beats him to non-Physics science very often). Has pockets of other knowledge but not really a generalist, hence my lower ranking.

[EDIT #1]

A few things were suggested to me regarding my top 5. First, that I look at Sun God for a better Ian-Rein comparison. I have looked, and though I agree that Rein's stats are better here (more powers and better PPG modulo shadows), they aren't better enough to change my ranking. Ian scores on par with Rein in their head-to-head, and has similar power-to-neg ratio. Second, that I am uncharitable to Rein's PIANO in my me-Rein comparison. I claimed his PPG was comparable to mine; I should have said it was significantly better, given his stronger teammates. But overall, he fares only slightly better than I do at PIANO, and I think I did better at ICT and Nats. So again, my rankings remain unchanged.

For a reply to the more general criticism my ballot has so far received (e.g. people saying they "hate" it), please refer to Kendrick Lamar's verse on "Control" by Big Sean.

6-15:

6. Jay Misuk

In my view, this is exactly the right spot for Jay. He doesn't (quite) have the breadth of the top 4, nor (quite) the specialist ability that Rein does, but he's a notch above the rest. His play improved significantly since last year (far fewer negs and greater consistency across games). He's obviously very deep in areas, quick on the buzzer, and can pick up bonus parts across the distribution. His very strong contribution to Toronto J, Canadian quizbowl's most underappreciated team, secures his position here. He's also an excellent driver.

7. Dennis Beeby

I underranked Dennis last year, not sure why. This is another pretty easy spot for me. He has accrued breadth, significantly more than most of those below, and is a strong history specialist. Haven't played against him enough times to say much more.

8. Zhenglin Liu

Tough choice between Chris and Zhenglin. Chris' analysis seems exactly right to me, but we reach a different conclusion. I think Zhenglin's depth is too powerful to put him any lower. He'd be a valuable addition to any team in quizbowl, dangerous against top teams at top difficulties, etc. I really hope he posts a ballot, too.

9. Chris Sims

Perhaps I have ranked Chris below Zhenglin because I'm still sore he beat me to a tossup on "Sforza" on a Last Supper clue (like two years ago). But he's a strong player, quick and agile, with admirable height. Has been a solid component of Toronto A, a consistently strong team.

10. Akhil Garg

A higher ranking than others have given him, so a bit of justification seems in order. Akhil is a Rock. Everything about him is consistent, including his neg rates. He knows his science and SS and buzzes on it. He's the best team player you could ask for -- quiet on bonuses that don't concern him (an underappreciated quality), and confident when he does know it. I think McGill's strong PPBs have been in large part due to his and Joe's chemistry on science conferring. Also, his kind and encouraging nature is actually a relevant factor in his ranking. I feel like I get a PPG boost just by sitting next to him. He knows a lot about the torsion balance. You can count on Akhil.

11. Gareth Thorlakson

Unfortunately, I haven't seen Gareth play enough to feel like I can rank him adequately, so I'm going on faith (i.e. other people's rankings) a bit here. He's definitely very strong at history -- maybe doesn't scale up quite as well to higher difficulties yet, but he will. He's also unfailingly friendly. I look forward to playing against him, and maybe even with him, in the future.

12. Aaron Dos Remedios

Another player I underranked last year. Aaron is very good. Strong across the entire distribution. Playing against him at PIANO reinforced this for me. Fast buzzer.

13. Erik Christensen

I like Erik. He's either the best or the worst reader in the circuit -- I can't decide. Very strong history player.

14. Joe Su

God damn Joe is underappreciated. His music is among the strongest 1/1s on the circuit. His science is very strong too. Look at his FST numbers for what he can do at lower difficulties without Akhil around (18 powers on 4 negs). And with Akhil around, he's still a very good team player. He consistently impresses me with the random (like, really random) shit he knows, especially in history and geography.

15. Paul Kasinski

Paul is good, don't sleep on Paul. Haven't seen him play much this year, but he's a reliable history player.

Just a gentle reminder that, if participation from Western Canada in this summer's batch of "Canadian circuit" tournaments is indeed a goal, then those dates should be picked sooner rather than later.

It's also my understanding that there are usually travel subsidies offered to teams from Ottawa/Montreal? The details of how, precisely, you plan to extrapolate those across larger distances is worth discussing. Something like $0.1/mile/team seems reasonable to me, and would probably allow UBC at least to bring other people besides just me.

Of course, we can discuss all this in a separate thread.

"We're not going to pay you to come to our tournaments" --- Paul Kasiński

WWP South, 2010-2014
NYU, 2014-2018
University of British Columbia, 2018-Present

Just a gentle reminder that, if participation from Western Canada in this summer's batch of "Canadian circuit" tournaments is indeed a goal, then those dates should be picked sooner rather than later.

It's also my understanding that there are usually travel subsidies offered to teams from Ottawa/Montreal? The details of how, precisely, you plan to extrapolate those across larger distances is worth discussing. Something like $0.1/mile/team seems reasonable to me, and would probably allow UBC at least to bring other people besides just me.

Of course, we can discuss all this in a separate thread.

Sorry, but what are you talking about?

$0.1/mile/team works out to a $209 discount for a team coming from Vancouver to Toronto, which is much more than the cost of any tournament. We're not going to pay you to come to our tournaments, no matter how much that "seems reasonable" to you. A larger travel discount (with a minimum payment, as always) for teams from far away would, of course, be reasonable, and I'm sure tournament hosts will be willing to discuss it with you.

Our summer tournament schedule is being worked out and announcements will be posted on the forums soon. If it is indeed your goal to come here and play them, then that's great and you'll be very welcome, as are all teams. Participation of U.B.C. in this summer's Canadian tournaments was certainly not "a goal" of this thread, however, if that's what your opening paragraph was suggesting (I'm not really sure what it was referring to), so let's take this conversation out of this thread, which is about something entirely different. You're welcome to look at the forum post for the already-announced weekend in June, as well as to pm me on Facebook about future events coming up later this summer, the locations and dates of which have not yet been finalised but should be soon.

$0.1/mile/team works out to a $209 discount for a team coming from Vancouver to Toronto, which is much more than the cost of any tournament.

This is just false. $209 CAD is $155 USD, which is about on the higher end for the fees for a single team at a tournament (before any discounts.) Chicago's FST mirror cost $120 USD, CO costs $250 USD, UGA's Spring Tournament cost $120 USD, and these are just some arbitrary ones. I'll admit that I didn't do the full math before contriving the figure, but it's inaccurate to say that it's completely out of left field.

A larger travel discount (with a minimum payment, as always) for teams from far away would, of course, be reasonable, and I'm sure tournament hosts will be willing to discuss it with you.

Wonderful.

Our summer tournament schedule is being worked out and announcements will be posted on the forums soon. If it is indeed your goal to come here and play them, then that's great and you'll be very welcome, as are all teams.

I'll take this to mean that you don't have an explicit policy of excluding teams from outside your area. Which is, of course, fantastic.

Participation of U.B.C. in this summer's Canadian tournaments was certainly not "a goal" of this thread

For sure, the goal of this particular thread is to rank Eastern Canadian quizbowlers. More generally, though, my understanding is that we came to a consensus (e.g. on Discord, and vaguely in this thread) that having Western Canadian teams play games against Eastern Canadian teams was a good thing, and that making it possible is desirable. Or, in other words, a "goal." Maybe I'm wrong about that. But it doesn't seem like I am.

You're welcome to look at the forum post for the already-announced weekend in June, as well as to pm me on Facebook about future events coming up later this summer, the locations and dates of which have not yet been finalised but should be soon.

Great, this was basically my point. That if teams from Western Canada are to play in Eastern tournaments, they'll need to know dates earlier (maybe "much earlier") than would teams from your immediate vicinity. I wasn't sure about using the thread for this purpose, but it didn't seem like many people were voting in the poll these days, and making a new thread felt like overkill. I'm open to a new thread though, if that seems wise.

"We're not going to pay you to come to our tournaments" --- Paul Kasiński

WWP South, 2010-2014
NYU, 2014-2018
University of British Columbia, 2018-Present

$209 CAD is $155 USD, which is about on the higher end for the fees for a single team at a tournament (before any discounts.)

I'd just like to clarify that we charge all our tournament fees at par with USD and do not adjust for the exchange rate, so $209 CAD would in fact be a very high fee for us as we're usually charging within the $100-150 CAD range.

Meghan Torchia
President, University of Toronto Academic Trivia Club (2015-2018)
University of Toronto, 2017 + CBY

$209 CAD is $155 USD, which is about on the higher end for the fees for a single team at a tournament (before any discounts.)

I'd just like to clarify that we charge all our tournament fees at par with USD and do not adjust for the exchange rate, so $209 CAD would in fact be a very high fee for us as we're usually charging within the $100-150 CAD range.

OK, that makes sense then. I bumped up my estimate a bit to account for the exchange. Thanks for clarifying.

"We're not going to pay you to come to our tournaments" --- Paul Kasiński

WWP South, 2010-2014
NYU, 2014-2018
University of British Columbia, 2018-Present

Some life stuff got in the way so my list this year is much more qualitative than last year, but here it is. Guideline was performance at regular difficulty, with a bonus for being able to scale up. As always, please direct any complaints to my former president, Meghan Torchia.

1. Derek So. Literally the only thing I know about this person is that he is really damn good at quizbowl. Seriously, who is this guy? Oh, I also know that he negs less than Rein.

2. Rein Otsason. Rein is hands-down the best science player in Canada and a top science player internationally – look at his Lederberg stats and also his stats from all other tournaments. The fact that he is that accomplished despite not knowing what the difference between transcription and translation is really is a testament to how good he is at math and physics. He was supposedly learning chemistry this year but I guess he came to the realization most people do that chemistry sucks. Negs exactly as much as Rein.

3. Aayush Rajasekaran. Aayush has always been very good at quizbowl, and this year he got even more good at quizbowl. His literature remains top notch at all levels and he scaled his ridiculously good low-level generalism up too, capped by an excellent showing at ICT. The gap between him and Rein closed considerably this year, especially since he negs less than Rein.

4. Daniel Lovsted. Daniel’s autobiography could probably be titled something like “Life in the Shadow of Derek So”. McGill played a lot of online tournaments against some really tough teams and he always acquitted himself well. His performance at PIANO without Derek was very strong, but perhaps less so than I would’ve expected with only 3 powers to Rein’s 10. He does, however, neg less than Rein.

5. Ian Dewan. Ian Dewan is the one-man show of the Canadian circuit and has been for a long time, often coming out to tournaments even if he has no teammates. Ian, by himself, made the top bracket of Regional and pulling out a truly impressive win against Jay/Aayush/Patrick/BHW. He also had the most powers out of all non-Derek players at Div I SCT and put up 6 powers at PIANO against a strong field of American teams. Negs less than Rein.

6. Jay Misuk. That’s the thing about these collegiate quizbowlers, man. Jay gets older, they stay the same age. Using his age and deep knowledge of lists of stuff, Jay quietly had a strong year playing with Aayush, putting up power numbers comparable to his teammate at PIANO and ICT. He’s the Rein of the “other” category in that he’s definitely the top geo/whatever-the-hell-goes-in-other players in Canada and a top one internationally. Negs ... more than Rein...?

7. Dennis Beeby. It’s too bad he didn’t get to play more in his last year, but Dennis had an impressive swan song performance by picking up three wins at Div I ICT and will leave behind the legacy of essentially single-handedly reviving quizbowl at Queen’s. I think he’ll be working in Toronto soon(?) so while he may not be in school anymore, Toronto continues to be a quizbowl cancer that leeches all the talent. Negs less than Rein.

8. Chris Sims. It’s too bad we don’t have advanced stats for every tournament, nor do I have the time this year to look through the ones we do have, because I think Chris’ strength is somewhat underrepresented by traditional stats. While his power numbers aren’t eye-popping, not many of his 10s are at the giveaway either. Chris is just an overall really solid player with moderately deep knowledge in a bunch of categories. Negs less than Rein.

9. Zhenglin Liu. It really was a tossup (ha!) between Chris and Zhenglin for these two spots. Zhenglin was a bit less active this year and doesn’t have as much generalism, but jfc does he have some of the deepest and most specific knowledge in the country and his power numbers are usually correspondingly strong. This man can scale up to the moon, and he negs less than Rein. As a bonus, he has also probably already placed the person who babysat you in third grade (whose existence you never disclosed to him) into a Canada-wide AU.

10. Aaron dos Remedios. While he doesn’t scale up quite as well as the people above him, Aaron is one of the strongest generalists in the country and does have certain deep pockets of knowledge. At a regular difficulty set, he’s a threat on pretty much every tossup except maybe history, and even then he might pull something out of his ass just because he’s been around so long. Negs about as much as Rein, though.

11. Gareth Thorlakson. I hate Grissle, but despite being approximately fetus years old, his history knowledge is the real deal. He tops the history scoring in every tournament he plays and led Toronto Sky to a 5th-place finish at Div II ICT, handing the champs Maryland B their only loss (hmmm sounds familiar...). While he’s picked up some lit for ICT and, Idk, apparently crashes an econ class or something (?), his non-history generalism is fairly weak so git gud pls. Also doesn’t know how clocks work. Negs less than Rein.

12. Erik Christensen. Erik hasn’t missed a beat moving from being the entirety of Waterloo into an open player territory, helped perhaps by the fact that we need to keep making things semi-open. He continues to be a strong generalist with deep history, film, and geography. Probably the most meta person in the circuit, for better or worse. Negs less than Rein.

13. Akhil Garg. Akhil likely tops the Most Likable Person ballot as well as the Most Fun Person To Play Against ballot. He just is really friendly and is always having fun, which makes it real sneaky when he has suddenly pulled all the science against you. He doesn’t spread out much beyond the science, but he’s a killer at that and scales up to the highest levels. Had a great neg at Sungod that I can’t talk about, but negs less than Rein.

14. Paul Kasinski. The Esteemed ATC President is dead, long live the Esteemed A.T.C. President. Having played with Paul a lot this year and seeing him on Toronto A, he definitely underestimates his own abilities. He’s shown that he has a lot of generalist knowledge on the shorthanded teams with me, seeing as I do literally nothing aside from bio/chem/lit and Paul is pretty lit himself. He has his moments, but definitely negs less than Rein.

15. Adam Swift. Adam, who is Totally Definitely 100% A Canadian, eats the canon for breakfast before he makes the drive up to the North for tournaments. His history is deep and his stats is underappreciated by quizbowl, but he’s continued to level up his generalism and accrue great buzzes across the board. Even after the American-to-Canadian conversion, negs less than Rein.

16. Patrick Liao. Raise your hand if you thought that Patrick would play any tournament this year, let alone as many as he did. Now put your hands down, you filthy liars. While quizbowl has definitely taken a backseat to his studies and it shows compared to his Penn days, he’s still one of the stronger history specialists with strong power numbers despite getting fewer buzzes overall. Negs less than Rein.

17. Colin Veevers. The greatest trombone content player in the country and probably one of the best in the world in addition to being one of the greatest Reach players. Oh, and I guess he does some science stuff in quizbowl too or something. Like his teammates, struggles with showing up to tournaments on time. He’s drawn comparisons to Rein for having great physics knowledge, but negs less than Rein.

18. Joe Su. Mr. Su is currently learning how to pass down his knowledge to the next generation, which consists of a lot of planes/trains/automobiles and a lot of science and a lot of music. Mostly the transportation stuff, though. It’ll be interesting to see how he reinvents himself as a player at Queen’s, away from the strong buzzing of McGill A. Negs less than Rein.

19. Jack van Nostrand. The sacrificial lamb at Div I SCT, he killed it despite getting killed. He put up the 4th-most powers there against some really tough teams (and Toronto B) as well as putting up solid numbers at Regionals playing alongside Dennis. He’s got an abundance of history and seems to be a theatre kid, automatically making the lit knowledge he his infinitely more real than mine. Negs less than Rein.

20. Ryan Hamilton. You guys see the performance Ryan put up at Regionals? Let me remind you: he had the sixth-highest history BPA across all fields. While his performances aren’t quite so strong, his history bowl pedigree gives him deep knowledge that translates to strong performances despite playing on a team with Gareth. He’s probably one of the strongest, if not the strongest CE player in Canada. I’ve heard like, 26 stories about how he got his accent and I’m not sure if I believe any of them. Negs less than Rein.

21. Sam Hauer. Pretend this is in a Scottish accent or something. Foreshadowed by an impressive upset win over McGill B last year, Sam killed it this year, leading Toronto Sam to a second-bracket finish at Div II ICT. His best category is history and politics/current events and he’s got a lot of music knowledge as well, but I’ve seen him pull some sick buzzes in a bunch of categories. I can’t decide whether he gets bonus points or penalities for the accents and bad jokes. Negs less than Rein.

22. Sky Li. Also Certainly For Sure A Canadian Who Is Not An American Fugitive, Sky rounds out the list of Toronto Sky members to make the top 25 in their first year. He was a generalist in high school because high school quizbowl is apparently a thing in the US (I know, right) but honed his fine arts specialty this year to fit his team as well as grabbing comp sci knowledge from his studies and some lit from no one on his team knowing any lit. Missed the bus to SCT and got arrested on his way there on a late bus after. Negs less than Rein.

23. Raymond Chen. Man, it’s so annoying that I think I got a lot better this year but there just so happens to be a miracle crop of first years to keep me out of the top 20. Negs less than Rein.

24. Kevin Lei. Absolutely crushed it at Div II SCT while putting up very serviceable performances at Regionals and Spartan despite dealing with Dennis and Jack. If they put their best foot forward I think Kevin and Jack will lead a very strong SCT and possibly ICT team next year. Negs less than Rein.

25. Leslie Newcombe. I think Leslie gets lost in the shuffle being a somewhat inactive open player without any particular really deep specialties that are consistently represented in quizbowl. What she does have is a wide variety of knowledge that can be used to pull off solid buzzes and pull random bonus parts. She doesn’t stand out, but she fits into almost any team both knowledge- and chemistry-wise. Negs less than Rein.

Honourary mention: Milan Fernandez. If I was putting up a ranking of players as they currently are, Milan makes the list for sure. He’s definitely the most improved over the course of the year, but a weaker first half leaves him off this year. Watch out for him in the coming years, he’ll definitely be Toronto’s top literature player soon as well as one of the best in Canada.

Rookie Ballot:
I seriously can't get over the fact that the top 4 rookies are all on the same team.

Finally, in the spirit of the discussion surrounding this year’s poll, I’d also like to take a moment to highlight some players from Western Canada that have performed well in limited tournaments this year:

Amanda Doyle (UBC) had an excellent Washington’s ACF Fall mirror, placing an impressive 6th out of 26 players in individual scoring and leading her team to the top of their bracket. I hear she does biology and literature, which are clearly the cool kid categories, so bonus points for that. Carlos Doebeli (UBC) also had a really solid Fall and SCT and appears to be a science generalist, which is always valuable. Dexter Hine (SFU) put up great numbers at UBC’s tournament with almost 3 powers a game. All of them combined probably still neg less than Rein.

1. Derek So: Best film player in the circuit. There’s other stuff he knows but who actually cares about that?

2. Rein Otsason: Rein is from what I understand one of the strongest active physics players in quizbowl in general? I’ve seen Rein self-destruct before but when he’s on his game he’s a force to be reckoned with (CO 2018, PIANO, SUNGOD). Pockets of non-insignificant knowledge in every subdistribution net him incredible buzzes sometimes. Excellent taste in film too.

3. Aayush Rajasekaran: Aayush attended the majority of Toronto practices this year since he lives here now and I got to learn firsthand just what an exceptional literature player he is. His reach extends far beyond just that though and into basically the entire distribution sans history. Regularly does great at Canadian sites but even when he plays in the states he has strong games.

4. Daniel Lovsted: Very impressive visual arts knowledge and his performance at Nats definitely does suggest to me that there could be an argument to be made for placing him higher. Strong at literature too but since PIANO is the only tournament he played without Derek it’s hard for me to ascertain just how good he is.

5. Ian Dewan: Topped the trash category at Regionals! I’m told he’s a decent generalist with strong specialties in music and math. His stats at Regionals and SUNGOD certainly support this. His excellent bow ties do too.

6. Jay Misuk: His specialization in history isn’t quite as strong as Aayush and Derek’s on literature and Rein’s in science but he is still pretty clearly the best history player in Canada. Another decent generalist. He’s also insane at geography.

7. Chris: Chris’ music knowledge is one of the strongest 1/1s on the circuit along with Rein’s physics knowledge. Great history and philosophy player as well. He suffers from some shadowing in all these categories from at least one teammate though.

8. Dennis: Dennis seems to be the better history player between him and Chris but I’m giving the edge to Chris because Dennis’ categories outside of that aren’t as strong as Chris’. Regardless, Dennis commanded a strong Queens team at Regionals and did pretty decent at ICT for someone who was soloing.

9. Zhenglin Liu: Supreme opera player. Scattered literature knowledge. All of his knowledge is pretty deep. His rather weak Philip Glass and John Cage appreciation is disconcerting though.

10. Erik Christensen: A strong if somewhat inconsistent player. His diverse knowledge base seems to translate quite well into academic quizbowl resulting in, at least this year, mostly impressive buzzes and the occasional dank neg. His specialties lie in history and philosophy but he can buzz everywhere outside of science. He’s pretty quickly improving at film to the point that it’s rather nerve-wracking. I’ll beat him to a Godard tossup one of these days.

11. Gareth Thorlakson: Gareth is a behemoth when it comes to history. He has very confident buzzes most of the time although they frequently result in him pausing with very audible uncertainty before delivering his answer as Raymond Chen has pointed out. It won’t be long before he can fully scale to Nationals difficulty. Look out for him.

12. Aaron Dos Remedios: Possibly my favourite player in the Canadian Circuit. Not lagging far behind Erik in meme knowledge. Lots of knowledge, especially of stock clues, but his very real literature and math knowledge is somewhat underrated. Hes also conquered Neopets and is just waiting for the much needed addition of the subject to the Other Academic slot.

13. Akhil Garg: Consistent as hell at picking up the science. His delightful disposition is, I believe, well documented but it’s worth reiterating: I would have no issue with losing every game I ever play against this man.

14. Paul Kasinski: Another person who gets absolutely wild buzzes sometimes. Very good at the history thing and decent at everything else.

15 Joe Su: Music might be the most crowded 1/1 category in the circuit but Joe doesn’t have much difficulty distinguishing himself there. He scales well but at regular difficulty and below he can buzz on tons of things outside of science and music (this generalism unfortunately doesn’t come across all that much when he’s playing with McGill A). A strong addition to any team.

16 Ryan Hamilton: In choosing Toronto C’s second scorer I opted for Ryan due to his sheer strength on history. His ACF Regionals performance was an incredibly impressive showing. Along with Daniel, Ryan suffers from one of the biggest shadow effects since he plays with Gareth. Gareth certainly has a stronger reach outside of history (though I’ve seen Ryan get buzzes in nearly every area outside of history using his history knowledge). From what I’ve seen Ryan scales up to harder difficulties very similarly to Gareth. Another player to watch out for.

17. Patrick Liao: Strong history player.

18. Colin Veevers: Best ecology player in the circuit? Colin’s knowledge base strikes me as a bit eccentric but it’s mostly concentrated within science. He has very good buzzing instincts (as well as a very animated method of gesturing when he tries to pull answers) but his science knowledge doesn’t scale as well as his teammates’ best categories. Nevertheless he was a core pillar of Toronto C this year and I don’t doubt he’ll improve quickly.

19. Adam Swift: Adam knows the canon and he knows it well (I may be copying something someone else has said before but I don’t remember and anyways it’s true). His history knowledge scales fairly well as evidenced by his PIANO stats. Tried to intimidate me out of buzzing on a film tossup this year and while it didn’t work I have to admire anyone who’s on the offense even when their categories aren’t in play.

20. Jack van Nostrand: Dual wielder of literature and history categories, whenever he did play he had impressive results. I am curious as to how he scales up past regular difficulty.

21. Sam Hauer: Team captain of Toronto D, frequent dispenser of puns, assumer of accents. My teammate gets buzzes all over the place but mostly history, music, and philosophy. His buzzing instincts have improved significantly and his desire to improve has grown tremendously so I’d be excited for next year if I were you. Also worth noting that Sam took two science tossups off of Rein this year so make of that what you will. I frequently forget that Sam’s shorter than me simply due to the immense presence he exudes.

22. Sky Li: It’s truly a testament to the monstrous strength of Toronto C that Sky who I thought would be the rookie of the year from the first few practices I saw him play at ended up being the fourth scorer on Toronto C. Decent generalism, very strong fine arts knowledge, specifically in music where I’ve seen him get some crazy buzzes (along with an overflow of history players, Toronto seems to be becoming a music player university). His history knowledge is good too though it gets almost entirely engulfed in darkness since he plays with Gareth and Ryan.

23. Raymond Chen: Very good at literature with a preference for modern stuff. Good biology and chemistry knowledge as well. This is maybe less relevant but it’s worth noting that Raymond has the best taste in trash in the circuit.

24. Kevin Lei: History player mostly but he’s also an avid fan of Wong Kar-wai which I thoroughly support. He did quite well throughout the year for yet another victim of the double shadow effect (playing with Jack and Dennis).

25. Simone Valade: Simone is quite good at biology but unfortunately she got shadowed by Akhil at SCT considerably. Her other tournaments this year, while few, show this knowledge and a strong consistency in her play.

I fear it may look like I have some vendetta against Rein, but conscience compels me, etc. etc. Also, the McGill chat challenged me to produce a compelling argument for my (repeatedly expressed) view here. So, here are some stats:

I fear it may look like I have some vendetta against Rein, but conscience compels me, etc. etc. Also, the McGill chat challenged me to produce a compelling argument for my (repeatedly expressed) view here. So, here are some stats:

In total, these two played 14 games (304 tossups) this eligibility period. Aayush scored 24/73/18 and Rein 24/52/24. That's a significant difference over a large sample size.

There are also the reasons I've cited before, namely Toronto J's better performance against stronger teams (McGill and at ICT) and Aayush's much better ICT. IMO it's a very clear decision. Sigh.

I think I'll push back a bit on some of the reasoning here, although I will more than readily admit that Aayush and Rein are very similar in ability and will reiterate that it's tough to decide which one is better. For one, I'm not sure counting HSNCT is particularly helpful for this exercise given how short the tossups are and the very low difficulty level in comparison to everything else being considered (I imagine buzzer speed, etc., plays a pretty big role there). So, that would bring us to 12/60/12 versus 12/44/18 on question sets that I think are more obviously comparable.

More importantly, I'm not totally enamoured with the approach of comparing their head-to-head gets even though, as you mention, there are enough data to make this sort of comparison looking across multiple tournaments. In this case, although Rein and Aayush are both strong generalists, their specialties differ significantly. I think it's reasonable to assume that at a regular difficulty and with reasonably strong and balanced teams (which they had at all of these tournaments, with the possible exception of OO) Rein and Aayush are getting a significant portion of their buzzes in categories where the other isn't especially competitive. This rests on the idea that H2H is most useful when comparing players with similar areas of strength but needlessly ignores a lot of data if the players in question have different strengths.

That being said, H2H is certainly one kind of evidence that could be used in this sort of ranking insofar as both players are generalists, but I think it is a fair bit weaker in this case than you make it out to be. If we exclude HSNCT, I don't think the differential in H2H is strong enough evidence for me personally to change my ordering of them.